Also, “what do you mean you don’t like being a statue” might be a thing a spacebat once said.
"The first taught restraint," as the Bazaar said. I’m pretty sure the Cantigaster’s current state is more to do with his imminent death from poison, though. The Masters didn’t realize they were betrayed until quite a while after the Second City fell.
On the other hand, imagine a petty bazaar sabotaging everything “because if I can’t have a happy marriage no one can.”
Erm. That the Masters do a bad job at granting immortality was a new thought for me. I have always been pretty sure they do this on purpose, because such is their humor. My character has always liked them for that, in fact. As for buyers’ regrets, well. Not that their buyers would ever be able to tell anyone on the Surface about them, right?
And I’m pretty sure the peach brandy does grant immortality. My Silver Tree character descended with the Fourth City and became immortal for no particular price, while the Widow’s lover did not.
With the next Exceptional Story coming around the corner, here are my thoughts on this last one:
Things I particularly liked:
- An interesting simple "slice of life" story (i.e. not involving the greater mysteries of the Neath, which is just fine).[/li][li]Some really good characters (the Devil, the Nurse, the Urchin), though others fell flat (the Admirer, the Poet).[/li][li]The writing was excellent.[/li][li]I really liked the ability to see all the possible end choices and so steer the story towards the desired conclusion.
Things I felt could have been improved:
- I really did not like that narrowing the end possibilities was phrased as: "Make her decision for her by limiting her choices". This felt so manipulative, and wasn’t called for (after all, the Nurse asks for advice and help). A more neutral phrasing would have been much better (e.g. "Resolve some of the Nurse’s problems to simplify her options/choice").[/li][li]The sequence in the Poet’s dream was a wasted opportunity. There could have been so much more there than just 4 options (with recycling airs). So much potential to experience strange things in his dream as well as to hint as "parabolic" things. with enough small content snippets there, I can easily see myself staying there for a long while just to sample it all (as was the case in the Century Exhibition).[/li][li]The Admirer was too undeveloped. I could see no reason to act in his benefit. The only "reason" the story gives me is that he loves the Nurse and has money. It might be a good start, but that’s not enough if she doesn’t reciprocate and the story doesn’t give me anything about their potential connection. It’s just too one-dimensional.[/li][li]There doesn’t seem to be any thematic connection to the Season. This is a Season which started with raising awareness that some of the lower classes in London are getting very unsatisfied. This was explored in the first story of the season via the Clay Men. I expected a story which dealt with some other faction or group and their resentment, leading up to something.
Summary:
I liked it and enjoyed it a lot, but I can’t say it’s one of my favourites.
Updated personal list of ranked Exceptional Stories
[spoiler]Excellent:
- Lost in Reflections[/li][li]Cut with Moonlight[/li][li]The Frequently Deceased[/li][li]The Waltz that Moved the World[/li][li]Flint[/li][li]The Century Exhibition[/li][li]The Twelve-Fifteen From Moloch Street[/li][li]The Persona Engine[/li][li]Where You and I Must Go
Good:
- The Pentecost Predicament[/li][li]The Calendar Code[/li][li]The Art of Murder[/li][li]The Chimney Pot Wars[/li][li]The Final Curtain[/li][li]The Heart, the Devil and the Zee[/li][li]Our Lady of Pyres[/li][li]The Clay Man’s Arm[/li][li]Five Minutes to Midday[/li][li]Discernment[/li][li]The Haunting at the Marsh House
Meh:
- The Last Dog Society[/li][li]The Seven-Day Reign[/li][li]The Court of Cats
[/spoiler]
>>>There doesn’t seem to be any thematic connection to the Season.
That was very dissapointing.
And there was no Zee in my story, so i have no idea why its in the title.
[quote=Waterpls]>>>There doesn’t seem to be any thematic connection to the Season.
That was very dissapointing.
And there was no Zee in my story, so i have no idea why its in the title.[/quote]
Yeah, the title seems… weird.
I mean, there’s a sort of "Heart" in the sense that the Admirer loves the Nurse, and there was a Devil (more a background character to consolidate the plot lines), and there was mention of the Zee (where the Nurse would like to go, and might do so in 1 of the 7 possible endings).
Neither of these three things is actually an integral part of the story’s plot.
Mildly bummed that there wasn’t any extra content in the urchin bits related to Stormy-Eyed (or if it was, it was gated >12). Seems like that could have provided some additional in-character context for the sister’s decision.[li]
I’d say matters of Heart were pretty integral to the story. The Admirer and Poet both love the Nurse, and the Nurse had been involved with the Poet, so a big part of the plot is which (if either) of them she’ll choose. There’s also familial love, with the Urchin torn between the Nurse and staying in the Flit.
I wouldn’t agree entirely. While there was no focus on the resentment aspect, the story did revolve around the results of the issues of the lower classes. The Nurse cut ties with the Poet to care for her sister, hence why she’s now overworked in her current profession. The Poet is in debt without a reliable source of income or money to pay for his vices. The Urchin lives in the Flit because her sister still lacks the money to pay for an education despite working herself into exhaustion.
There was some love involved, but I wouldn’t say it’s integral to the story. Yes, the Admirer loves the Nurse, and the Nurse loves her sister (and used to love the Poet). But it’s more like background information. It doesn’t affect the plot much.
Also, even so, the title seems awkward. If this is the element to emphasize, then I feel that "Love, the Devil and the Zee" would work better than using an actual object name like "The Heart".
I wouldn’t agree entirely. While there was no focus on the resentment aspect, the story did revolve around the results of the issues of the lower classes. The Nurse cut ties with the Poet to care for her sister, hence why she’s now overworked in her current profession. The Poet is in debt without a reliable source of income or money to pay for his vices. The Urchin lives in the Flit because her sister still lacks the money to pay for an education despite working herself into exhaustion.[/quote]
Yes, it involved people of a lower class. But that’s not exactly the season’s apparent theme, which is described with the following phrases:
- "The People Awakening"[/li][li]"The powerful whisper of discontent, and fear for their position. The downtrodden, the desperate and the ignored seethe at their plight. Something is bound to give, and soon."[/li][li]"Each of this Season’s Exceptional Stories will encourage another portion of London’s downtrodden to rise."
None of this is relevant for this month’s story, which affected no one except the 4 main characters (with the Devil watching from the side with no actual involvement). This was a simple (and good!) story about person A who likes person B, who used to like person C but now isn’t sure who and what to choose, while person D is off having fun but might return home.
Contrast this with last month’s story, which also involved very few actual characters, but was part of a general movement of discontent among a certain faction (Clay Men).
[quote=dov]
There was some love involved, but I wouldn’t say it’s integral to the story. Yes, the Admirer loves the Nurse, and the Nurse loves her sister (and used to love the Poet). But it’s more like background information. It doesn’t affect the plot much.
Also, even so, the title seems awkward. If this is the element to emphasize, then I feel that "Love, the Devil and the Zee" would work better than using an actual object name like "The Heart". [/quote] (rest snipped)
Ah, sir, but you are reckoning without the propensity of Fallen London’s writers never to refer simply to matters of emotion where a hint of the gross and literal will do. Romantic Notions are crudely symbolized, not with a Valentine or a more sentimental expression, but with an anatomically correct sketch of a human heart. Come to think of it, one could say that the April ES is really more about romantic notions of all kinds, rather than love per se, making the "Heart" reference more appropriate and, perhaps, more inevitable.
Honestly, this felt both frustrating and rewarding in that there were no ‘right’ answers, and no particular ‘winning play’, which was very attractive.
Interestingly, despite Mistress W’s devotion to family, in this case, I felt that not taking the obvious choice was earned here.
Like many others, overall it felt earned. Like anyone else with a dependent, the slow grinding drain of sublimating one’s own desires to the needs of another.
[quote=dov]
Yes, it involved people of a lower class. But that’s not exactly the season’s apparent theme, which is described with the following phrases:
[ul][li]"The People Awakening"[/li][li]"The powerful whisper of discontent, and fear for their position. The downtrodden, the desperate and the ignored seethe at their plight. Something is bound to give, and soon."[/li][li]"Each of this Season’s Exceptional Stories will encourage another portion of London’s downtrodden to rise."[/quote][/li][/ul]Thinking about it, none of the stories really fit the "theme" per say. Even the first one wasn’t so much about Clay discontent as it was a predatory cultist preying on his fellow living statues. Each is very much an individual story. The thing that links them together is how you first learn about each story through expressions of public discontent on the London street: a crowd, a temperance protest, a popular rumor… It’s like you’re on the edge of a sea shore collecting the driftwood the waves wash up to you. I think when the wave finally hits us it will be its own story. Perhaps the trade-in items we are collecting - the Clay Arm, the Notes, the Headline, will have something to do with bringing that about?
I know this is a bit late for a review, but better late than never.
This was my favorite story of the season and probably one of my favorite Exceptional Stories period. This was partly due to the interesting characters and clever writing, but the main reason I loved this story was the visit to the Drowned Forest.
When I was in elementary school I at some point imagined and drew, in colored pencil, a picture of an underwater city. There weren’t any mermaids, fish or sea monsters in this city – nothing really aquatic. It was just an ordinary terrestrial city, with Mesoamerican stepped pyramids, fruit tree orchards, fields and human inhabitants, only inexplicably located deep underwater. The inhabitants could (somehow) breathe the water like people breath air. They avoided floating around by wearing metal clothes, the weight of which allowed them to stroll the boulevards, fields and orchards as if they were on the surface.
So when my character swam down into the Drowned Forest, which is filled with pines, birches, lilies, and crumbling stone towers, it reminded me of that childhood drawing. The result was that the Drowned Forest actually felt like a place I had encountered before, which as a bonus is exactly how Parabola is supposed to feel. This is no doubt a very idiosyncratic reason to really like a story, but there you are. It made me remember something and I really enjoyed it for that.
I also really liked the Currents of the Drowned Forest, which added to the whole new area’s distinctive charm. They’re all collected below, if anyone else is interested.
[spoiler][quote=Currents of the Drowned Forest]A woman swims by – her long hair billows out in the water. She smiles, wave, and is gone.
Something swims overhead, its shadow falls across you.
Discarded snake-skin gleams brightly from where it is caught on a nearby tree.
Light as orange as a fresh pumpkin filters down from above.
A broken tower looms in the murk. A tree crumbles, falls, and occludes it from view.
A crown falls past you to the bottom of the lake.
A tilting fern brushes your arms. Its long branches twine about you like coiling serpents.
There is a thrumming noise. Is this how a purr would sound underwater?[/quote][/spoiler]
edited by Anne Auclair on 5/21/2017
I loved this story: the plot is simple and well-organized, and the problem is thorny but natural. There were no artificial extreme dilemmas (sometimes they are also fascinating, though.), but "each choice has its shadow".
Different endings for all the characters in different cases explained each other well enough. (After I had made my choice, I spent one hour stalking your journals:)) Quite enjoyable, thanks.
EDIT: Terrible mistakes.
edited by Fadewalker on 6/14/2017
Oh, this was…different! A very small-scale story, but the choices felt that much more important!
I was agonizing over the choices, worried I would make the wrong one and condemn the Nurse to a lifetime of misery, but a choice had to be made and eventually, I decided she doesn’t need anyone in her life but her sister. The result only made me feel strongly that my decision was right.
From the mentions of her sister, I knew I couldn’t let her go. The Nurse would always mourn her. And I didn’t like the Poet one bit and I wouldn’t have liked his results either. I was however debating the Admirer…his heart seemed to be in the right place and it would take some stress off of the Nurse, but then again, why should she settle for someone she doesn’t love?
Now she’s happy with her sister and my heart is filled with warmth and fuziness.
Thank you for the excellent story!
I really liked that story. The fact that you could see all the potential endings from the start, and that all are different shade of good and bad, was the most engaging mechanic. I feel bittersweet about the choice I made, but in a good way. Exploring parabola and spite was fine, but kind of removed from the human drama, so I think those are the weakest part of the story. As for my choices I was convinced that the sister should make her own choice in life, and every body who talked about taking her to school we’re really patronizing. I could understand why she wanted to stay with a sister, but I recommended that she followed her heart and joined the urchin-gangs. The Poet would not abandoned his art, and even in his finale choice, it’s more about continuing to make art from his muse or making art for some other reason. So I told him to find inspiration elsewhere, because the Nurse deserved better than being an object for inspiration and because he should diversify if he want to make better art.The Admirer was a coward, so I told him to **** off. After making all these choice, I couldn’t help but think that I had removed everything form the Nurse life. Yes, she can follow her passion and got to the zee, but everybody that mattered to her was gone. What is a meaningful life, is it to follow our dream, our in making connections with each other? I don’t know. I am still torn, and sad, but in a good way. I don’t regret the choice I made, but I don’t know if I improved the Nurse’s life, or rob it of meaning. So yes, this story was really good.